Dec. 29 (Bloomberg) -- New York City’s traffic fatalities
this year dropped to a record low 237, due to re-engineered
roads and intersections, better enforcement and safety
education, Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan said.

The city beat its previous low of 258 in 2009. In 2001, the
year before Mayor Michael Bloomberg assumed office, 393 died,
according to a department new release.

The mayor and Sadik-Khan released the numbers at a Brooklyn
news conference during a week when Bloomberg reported city
residents’ life expectancy has reached 80.6 years for a baby
born in 2009, and its projected homicide tally -- slightly more
than 500 -- may be the third-lowest since record-keeping began
in 1963.

“This will be the city’s safest traffic year in the more
than 100 years since records were kept,” Bloomberg said in a
statement. “It’s another reason New Yorkers are living longer
and another reason our city is safer than ever before.”

Sadik-Khan said changes to the cityscape protected people.

“The reduction in traffic deaths as a result of our safety
engineering means nearly 300 New Yorkers are alive today who
would not have been if we had simply sustained the fatality rate
of five years ago,” she said in a prepared statement.

National Decrease

The city’s trend toward fewer road fatalities is consistent
with the U.S. rate, which in 2010 declined 2.7 percent to
32,885, the lowest since 1949, according to the National Highway
Traffic Safety Administration. The first three months of this
year showed continued decreases, the agency’s website said.

“Promoting strong traffic safety laws coupled with high-visibility enforcement, rigorous vehicle safety programs, public
awareness campaigns, and improvements in roadway design” are
the reasons for the national reduction, David Strickland, the
agency’s administrator, said in an e-mail.

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